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Justice Dept. scales back crypto cases in line with Trump administration memo
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- yodsanklai 1y agoHow does separation of powers work in the US? could Trump decide not to prosecute let say financial fraud in general?
- etchalon 1y agoThe Executive Branch, of which Trump is granted oversight in our Constitution, is responsible for the enforcement of our laws. Our courts have established that the Executive branch can't decide which laws to enforce, but can prioritize which laws to enforce.
- bell-cot 1y agoIANAL, but at the Federal level I'd say "yes". States can do their own thing, using their own laws & resources, +/- the risk of annoying Trump.
- perihelions 1y agoYes; the president in the US is in charge of the federal prosecuting agency, and has, in practice*, unlimited power to direct non-prosecution. (And, separately, also has plenary power to pardon federal crimes). *Late edit: there was an historic case study of this power balance, just a few weeks ago. When Trump directed the DoJ to suspend the criminal prosecution of NYC mayor Eric Adams, in order to corruptly use the continuing threat of prosecution as a cudgel to extort policy concessions from his office, no federal prosecutor had any ability to resist that order. At least seven resigned[0] rather than obey it. The illustration being: whatever laws might say and whatever ethical norms exist—a federal prosecutor, as an employee of the executive branch under the POTUS, has no practical ability to contradict what the POTUS directs them to do. [0] https://www.npr.org/2025/02/14/nx-s1-5298040/justice-department-eric-adams-fallout https://www.npr.org/2025/02/14/nx-s1-5298040/justice-departm... ("Fallout from Eric Adams case continues at the Justice Department")
- empath75 1y agoThe check on everything that Trump is doing is _impeachment_, and congress can't get it's shit together to protect its own power. The whole design of the federal government was that ambitious assholes in Congress would keep ambitious assholes in the White House in check, and it doesn't work if Congress is full of lickspittles and cowards.
- mandevil 1y agoFor the longest time, it worked in the US because we had overlapping political parties. For reasons (mostly having to do with race) you had conservative and liberal Democrats and Republicans, and they overlapped a lot ideologically, so bills would pass mostly in a bipartisan way (even something like the creation of Medicare and Medicaid got about half the minority party to support it- https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/89-1965/h35 https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/89-1965/h35 and https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/89-1965/s151 https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/89-1965/s151). Over the past 30 years that has gone away and parties are strictly sorted ideologically. My personal theory for that is the decline of local news. With Facebook and Craigslist killing the local advertising business all that's left is national news sources, and so all people know about their local Rep or Senator is the letter after their name, and their opinion on the President, there is no room for looking at someone as an individual. And so the people who could be an individual have largely left, and replaced by a great mass of indistinguishable nonentities.
- empath75 1y agoI think counter-intuitively, a lot of the anti-corruption reforms in congress basically destroyed the ability of congress to write compromise bills, because you could no longer buy people off by building a highway in their district or whatever. It would probably be a good thing to bring back horse trading and earmarks again, somewhat.
- ramesh31 1y ago>How does separation of powers work in the US? could Trump decide not to prosecute let say financial fraud in general? He can "do" essentially anything, per the supreme court. For 250 years we had norms and customs and decorum and shame that kept things from escalating to a constitutional crisis. But that has all been so thoroughly broken at this point that literally no one knows what will happens next. One thing is certain, that there will be no way out of this but elections.
- empath75 1y ago> He can "do" essentially anything, per the supreme court. This is often said, but it's not true and it has nothing to do with anything that Trump is doing. What they ruled is that he can't be _prosecuted_ for most actions he takes as president. It obviously doesn't mean that the Supreme Court can't overrule executive actions, because they continued to do that after that ruling was made. And as much as Democrats complained about it at the time, it's probably the only thing keeping Biden from facing some kind of phony indictment right now. The _only_ thing that is allowing Trump to get away with this is Congress's inability to act, or passive acquiescence to what he's doing.
- ceejayoz 1y ago> It obviously doesn't mean that the Supreme Court can't overrule executive actions… What is their plan for enforcing said ruling?
- empath75 1y agoThey have only _ever_ been able to enforce their rulings through the acquiescence of the other branches. There's no enforcement mechanism in the constitution, and neither is judicial review, for that matter. If the president wants to ignore the court, and congress doesn't do anything about it, there's nothing the courts can do, and that has always been true.
- ceejayoz 1y ago
- ceejayoz 1y agoYes. For a concrete example, see marijuana.
- SoftTalker 1y agoYes discretionary (non) prosecution is what opened the door to legalization. Very few lawmakers would run on that issue 20 years ago. But as prosecutors in some areas stopped bringing cases for possession, it became more normalized and full legalization became more acceptable as it was de-facto what was happening anyway. And, it's a new thing to tax which is always going to get attention.
- ty6853 1y agoThe statute of limitations for many crimes exceed the term of any executive, so this is quite risky to rely on. You could just be prosecuted by the next guy for crimes done under the previous guy.
- ceejayoz 1y agoThe executive can fairly trivially prevent that on the way out. For example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proclamation_4483 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proclamation_4483
- ty6853 1y agoAbsolutely true but it's worth noting this has only been done for a small fraction of marijuana crimes, and as far as I know not at all through the backdoor method commonly used (by all administrations) where they just prosecute otherwise legal gun ownership as "owned a gun plus owned weed" and backdoor it as a gun crime.
- sunaookami 1y agoThe US has no real seperation of powers.
- wrs 1y agoWell, yes it does, but it doesn’t do any good if two of the branches decide not to exercise their power.
- cmurf 1y agoTo the degree that would promote widespread corruption, it's inconsistent with the president's oath of office and the Constitutionally defined duty that the president uphold the law. But it's also a political question (this means the Court probably won't get involved, not that the question is normal politics) because the only way to end such an obvious travesty is to impeach, convict, and remove from office. To whatever degree the Congress can't do that, impugns the Congress who all take an oath to support and defend the Constitution, not a leader. To whatever degree people continue to elect those who support and defend a cult instead of the Constitution? They have given in to passion, and can't be reasoned with. Why argue with irrational people?
- UncleMeat 1y agoThe constitution requires that the executive "shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." The executive is not granted unlimited power to refuse to enforce the law. However, courts have historically given the executive leeway in how it chooses to prioritize things and this has led to plenty of cases where the federal government has official policy to deprioritize enforcement of certain crimes. This has not been abused too much in the past but I'm not sure if that norm will hold in the future.
- scryers_bloom 1y agoUnfortunately, the Constitution's text has been increasingly under subject of debate. Trump himself is trying to redefine the meaning of the jurisdiction clause in birthright citizenship.
- shadowgovt 1y agoCorrect. In general, the backstop would be Congress saying "Enough" and threatening impeachment were the law not enforced. There have been interesting examples on both sides of the aisle of strategic non-enforcement. When states began legalizing marijuana, the law is quite clear (as per the supremacy clause) that federal law enforcement can still enforce the restrictions on growing and selling it. The Obama administration made extremely clear that within the states where it had been legalized, enforcing the federal law would be a career-limiting move for the relevant federal agents. AFAIK, every administration since has de-facto kept that policy regarding those states, even though Congress has never moved to make marijuana legal to use and distribute.
- jefurii 1y agoIn preparation for the kleptocrats to loot various pools of money from the government.
- SoftTalker 1y ago> Instead of policing crypto platforms and exchanges, Trump’s DOJ will “focus on prosecuting individuals who victimize digital asset investors, or those who use digital assets in furtherance of criminal offenses such as terrorism, narcotics and human trafficking, organized crime, hacking, and cartel financing.” Wonder if this hints at possibly reducing or relaxing KYC rules also?
- BoiledCabbage 1y ago> Wonder if this hints at possibly reducing or relaxing KYC rules also? Good call, I would assume so. KYC helps prevent money laundering, bribes and a ton of other illegal transactions. Eliminating it would line up with other actions performed by this admin.
- mschuster91 1y agoOn the other side KYC rules and enforcement can be anything from annoying to downright asinine (and not just for banks). I'd prefer if governments would take a step back and invest into enforcing actual crimes themselves and not just stick with money laundering charges because these are easier to prove. It was already bad under Al Capone (who got nabbed for taxes instead of murder), and it's way worse today.
- SoftTalker 1y agoRight, that was more my line of thinking. Possession of >$10,000 in cash should not be a crime or assumed to be evidence of one.
- mschuster91 1y agoCivil forfeiture is even worse, indeed. Legalized highway robbery.
- SoftTalker 1y agoYou should also be able to go into a bank and deposit $10k in cash without an anal exam or mandatory reporting to the federal government.
- 9283409232 1y agoIf you didn't see this coming when he launched a memecoin then I don't know what to tell you. > Per Blanche’s memo, which was circulated on Monday, the Justice Department is dropping litigation and enforcement actions “while President Trump’s actual regulators do this work outside the punitive criminal justice framework.” Elon Musk and Russell Vought have been trying to kill the CFPB and the SEC is toothless now so what financial regulators is he talking about?
- Animats 1y agoThe words "President Trump" appears in that memo six times. Does someone have a "suck up" filter that inserts this?
- gmd63 1y agoIt's so painfully obvious to anyone paying attention that his whole character reeks of fraud. How this news could ever come as a surprise to anyone is a testament to how poorly our mainstream and social media outlets have informed the citizenry.
- bongodongobob 1y agoIt's been obvious since the 70s. That's what baffles me so much. He's been the face of the rich person asshole fraudster for 50 years. I cannot wrap my head around it.
- shawn_w 1y agoWhoever it was that hired him for The Apprentice has a lot to answer for.
- phonon 1y agohttps://apnews.com/article/trump-apprentice-producer-burnett-envoy-united-kingdom-add9ff1ff9f72ddba482410f46070977 https://apnews.com/article/trump-apprentice-producer-burnett...
- Zigurd 1y agoI know people, some of them educated, who are absolutely addicted to Burnett's reality TV shows. Those shows are uniformly routinely cruel to their participants. I find it creepy that some people are attracted to that kind of entertainment. There's something deep inside them that I don't want to see.
- Fairburn 1y agoIt's because the folks in the back-end of things like what he represents in terms of wealth consolidation and fewer lookie-loos to peek inside to see what's truly going on. "Trump" is a symptom of much broader things that can only be fixed by fire. And even then, just like the cockroach, he'll scurry away under the baseboards to hide until his next meal.
- xrd 1y ago[flagged]
- bongodongobob 1y agoBiff's whole schtick in Back to the Future 2 was literally based on Trump.
- stronglikedan 1y agoExcept it wasn't. The character was nothing like Trump ever was. If you remember correctly, Trump was America's darling up until the second he announced he was running as a Republican. This was the most obvious smear campaign in history, and no one could have survived it like him had the actually been guilty of any of it.
- seanp2k2 1y agoHe's been a pariah since the 80s at least. See eg Muppets Episode 2399 about Grump Tower https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FeyDm4vrFo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FeyDm4vrFo or https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/1988-the-year-donald-lost-his-mind-213721/ https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/1988-the-yea... for a more detailed history on some of his decisions. From the article regarding his 1987 first book: Reviewers trashed Donald Trump’s first book. They dismissed The Art of the Deal as self-promotional pap. They called the author a huckster. “The man’s lack of taste is as vast as his lack of shame,” said the Washington Post. Fortune noted his “shallowness” and “pomposity” and his need for “more money,” more “toys” and “more attention.” The book, said The New Republic, “is a weapon in the continuing public relations war that is Donald Trump’s way of doing business.”
- jajuuka 1y agoThis reads like campaign copy.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
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- fragmede 1y agothis is good for Bitcoin
- tombert 1y agoIt might be good for Bitcoin, it's bad for pretty much everything else. We depend on our institutions to investigate cases of fraud. If all a fraudster has to do in order to legally commit fraud is to launder it through a cryptocurrency then of course every fraudster is going to do that. It's getting fucking exhausting seeing how blatant this orange president is being without even trying to pretend he's not corrupt. He launched two cryptocurrencies on the day he took office, and he's in charge of a publicly traded company. Frankly I am kind of just sick of this cryptocurrency shit in general. I am embarrassed that I ever fell for it, and frankly if anyone still believes in it as a concept at this point then I really don't understand why.
- scryers_bloom 1y agoI try to view things like this from the other perspective and wonder just why so many people still view this person like he's the common man's savior. I think I'm cognitively dissonance-ing myself from possibly all the cognitive dissonance I'm surrounded with.
- paulgb 1y agoI’m not a fan of Trump but my steelman argument for this is: policing public markets is a public good because efficient capital markets are the bedrock of a capitalist society. It’s hard to make the same case for crypto, which (despite the insistences of its participants) more or less exists in isolation from the rest of the market. The industry feels it is over-regulated. Makes sense that a more lassiez-faire leader would take a more hands-off approach to it.
- nielsbot 1y agoBut what’s to reason to not prosecute lawbreakers/fraud?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- paulgb 1y agoMy read is that they will still prosecute fraud once it happens, they just won’t proactively regulate the industry.
- stevenwoo 1y agoI’m thinking there will be prosecution but there will be quid pro quo’s like the guy Trump just pardoned after the felon donated 2 million to GOP. https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/nikola-founder-milton-pardoned-by-trump-after-fraud-conviction https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/nikola-founder-mil... Wipe the slate so the felon no longer owes money for fraud.
- bamboozled 1y ago
- thm 1y agoWaPo Gift Link: https://wapo.st/4cpZiWJ https://wapo.st/4cpZiWJ
- neonate 1y agoArticle: https://archive.ph/A9CD5 https://archive.ph/A9CD5 The memo: https://archive.ph/Td0Fn https://archive.ph/Td0Fn (via https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43636327 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43636327)
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- theLiminator 1y agolol anyone know if this might mean that americans will get access to Binance (specifically not Binance US)?
- tromp 1y ago[flagged]
- aaronbrethorst 1y agoTurns out the real rug pull was on November 5.
- skizm 1y agoDo we think FTX would have been prosecuted if Trump were in office? Note that if FTX were able to hide its fraud for a few more months, they would have been able to bounce back and then some. Not saying that makes it better or worse, but a few months of questionably legal delay tactics would probably go over fine these days (is my 2 cents).
- NickC25 1y agoYes, absolutely. Why? Because Sam donated to Democrats in addition to the GOP. Paying both sides, or playing both sides, doesn't matter. Sam donated money to the GOP's mortal enemy. That's a sin. Trump would have thrown the fucking book at him and then some.
- whatever1 1y ago[flagged]
- sitkack 1y agoThere is no mandate, Trump received under 50% of the votes
- nzeid 1y agoA few comments here have hinted at this: we don't need to have a debate about penalizing platforms for the fraud of the users, everyone agrees that's problematic. The reason this directive confuses me is because very often the fraudsters are the platform runners themselves.
- nielsbot 1y agoIf your goal is to shield them from government enforcement it’s not confusing at all. Trump serves only to serve himself consummately.
- thelastgallon 1y agoCan SBF be out now?
- tim333 1y ago"DOJ will no longer prosecute cryptocurrency fraud" is clickbait and not what the Todd Blanche memo says. They will still go after the Sam Bankman-Frieds: >Prosecutors shall prioritize cases that hold accountable individuals who (a) cause financial harm to digital asset investors and consumers; and/or (b) use digital assets in furtherance of other criminal conduct... But seem to be intending to deal with whether it is ok to do things like issue trump token by setting regulations rather than prosecuting companies after the event. Which is not wholly a bad idea. Memo text here: https://archive.ph/Td0Fn https://archive.ph/Td0Fn
- smrtinsert 1y agoMany reasons why this wouldn't be sufficient. Having a fall guy is a good example, doesn't allow for action against organization level willful fraud would be another. It basically slows down any sort of justice. Just another good reason to stay out of crypto unless you're already rich and have money to gamble.
- dang 1y ago(This was originally posted as a reply to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43634582 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43634582, but it's a substantive comment so I've merged it along with the others.)
- bbatha 1y ago> ok to do things like issue trump token by setting regulations That would make sense if the Trump admin were actually regulating crypto but they're tearing that up as well.[1] Why would Trump regulate his own scam coins? Finally regulation isn't a magic wand that stops behavior, it stops it with the threat of punishment after the event. So no this doesn't make sense. 1: https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5170036-trump-sec-crypto-industry-changes/ https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5170036-trump-sec-cryp...
- DennisP 1y agoYes, but typically there are clear guidelines on what will be punished and what is allowed. That was not the case under Gensler. Crypto companies begged for clear regulations and the SEC steadfastly refused to publish any. Instead they just filed enforcement actions and people had to find out their view of things in court. And as your link says: > “We in the crypto space felt it was very deceptive the way they [the Biden administration] went about dealing with crypto firms. They told crypto firms to come in and register, to come in and engage with them,” said Nic Carter, a founding partner at crypto investment firm Castle Island Ventures. “There was no meaningful way to do that.”
- nikolay 1y agoAnd how is this a good thing?! This goes massively against crypto to a massive level - now less people will want to touch it even with a 10-foot pole!
- lamp_book 1y agoThe minnows all think they are sharks.
- efitz 1y agoThe title of the article on the website is misleading and actually untrue. The memo did not say “no longer targeting fraud”- it said that it was no longer targeting individuals and exchanges for regulatory missteps. The theme of the memo is “we’re not going to use mountains of regulations written for non-crypto regulation to go after crypto exchanges”, which is in line with a general regulatory themes of the Trump administration to avoid “lawfare” type activities and reduce regulatory burdens. In fact, the memo specifically said (according to the article, near the end) that the government would focus their efforts on fraud against crypto investors. Now you might or might not agree with these goals, and you might or might not support the Trump administration, and you might or might not like Trump, but the article headline was at odds with the article content and with the DoJ memo.
- dang 1y ago(This was originally posted as a reply to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43634582 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43634582, but it's a substantive comment so I've merged it along with the others.)
- trust_bt_verify 1y agoSeems like an odd choice to move some but not all comments between posts like this. Especially when the only ones moved seem to be conservative talking points. This one even discusses a title that doesn’t exist on this article?
- dang 1y ago> Seems like an odd choice to move some but not all comments between posts like this The idea is to move good, substantive comments that have something to contribute to the new thread, and to leave the ones that don't fit that description and are bound by the context of the previous article. I'm not saying I made all the calls perfectly about which ones to move and which ones to leave, but that's the idea at least! If there are cases I missed, I'd be happy to take a look. > Especially when the only ones moved seem to be conservative talking points. You can't jump to conclusions like that from such a paltry handful of datapoints. I say "you can't", but of course you can, because everyone does! But it's not reliable to do so: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=%22always%20feels%22%20mods%20by%3Adang&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... > This one even discusses a title that doesn’t exist on this article? Yes, that's why I replied—to make the context switch explicit because otherwise the comment wouldn't make sense.
- iJohnDoe 1y agoPurely about helping Russia and North Korea. They must be laughing so hard how easily it is to manipulate Trump to do their bidding.
- rdtsc 1y ago> prior Administration used the Justice Department to pursue a reckless strategy of regulation by prosecution What was the idea before? It wasn't necessarily illegal but they prosecuted it anyway? > Executive Order 14178 requires the Justice Department to prioritize investigations and prosecutions that involve conduct victimizing investors, including embezzlement and misappropriation of customers’ funds on exchanges, digital asset investment scams, fake digital asset development projects such as rug pulls, hacking of exchanges and decentralized autonomous organizations resulting in the theft of funds, and exploiting vulnerabilities in smart contracts. Such enforcement actions are important to restoring stolen funds to customers, building investor confidence in the security of digital asset markets, and the growth of the digital asset industry. I guess before anyone using these crypto services was a target for prosecution and now they are not, just by the virtue of using them.
- wmf 1y agoBefore they prosecuted 1% of crypto scams and now they're going to prosecute 0%.
- caycep 1y agoalso, the always thorough Molly White https://www.citationneeded.news/issue-81/ https://www.citationneeded.news/issue-81/
- bananapub 1y agowhat an amazing investment! cryptocurrency criminals donated just a few hundred million to Trump's "campaign" (primary money laundering op), and they get a license to do infinity crime against the government and civilians. corruption has the best ROI around, by fucking far.
- edwardoelliott6 1y ago[dead]
- psk527743 1y ago[flagged]
- janneymarion 1y ago[dead]